At 3:10 PM -0500 6/25/1998, Adam Wodon wrote:
>
> My overall point is -- I think that being fair to everyone is going to
> ultimately be at the expense of the overall influx of dollars and
> exposure.
>
> I'm not saying that's a bad thing ... just pointing out that the two
> things cannot co-exist.
>
> Being fair to the little guy will limit the exposure of college hockey,
> unless some unforeseen force of nature intervenes.
 
I have to admit I see your scenario as being more likely than Greg's.
Partly because as you say, it has already been played out in other sports.
I'm not sure that hockey has an immunity to it.  We can look at the NHL
where small markets continue to get forced out and have their teams
relocate elsewhere.  And I am under the impression that the CHL is going
through the same thing in a way.
 
I expect that what we will see happen is that people like the conference
commissioners will continue to try to balance things off, grow the game
while keeping things as fair as possible for the "little guy".  I don't see
any other way to do it.
 
And my point with regard to conference tv scheduling is, as long as these
teams are part of your league, you have to accommodate them.  Let's say
that a league has a chance at a bigtime tv contract (ESPN, etc.) but the
network will only air games involving the subset of your teams that it
finds attractive.  Then the league has a decision to make.  Nix the deal
and keep the little guys happy.  Or form a new league with those teams that
are "attractive" (or have the other teams leave).
 
However at least in the short term, the arrangement I think is more likely
is that the conferences as a whole will sell a deal to a network which will
involve an "attractive" subset of teams from among the leagues.  You can
sort of justify this by realizing that it will just be logistically
impossible to get every team on tv -- there will not be enough games.  But
this will also continue to move things towards the situation that you
described.  You could perhaps work out a deal so that the teams not on tv
still share in the revenues.  But they will not have the recruiting power
that the tv teams will have...and also at some point the teams on tv will
probably get tired of sharing the wealth.
 
But there may be a built in safety valve for the schools that may become
the Creightons and Fordhams of D1 hockey.  Many of those are D2-3 schools.
If 20 or 30 years down the road it happens that those schools can't
compete, then there is the option to go to D2 or 3.  It wouldn't happen en
masse, but it could happen gradually.
 
The schools that may have the most trouble at that time are the ones that
are D1 athletically and cannot drop down.  Therefore still another
possibility is that conferences will continue to realign so that schools
with similar situations are grouped together.  Those "little guy" teams may
wind up in their own new leagues where they are all in the same boat yet
can still qualify for an NCAA bid.  In that regard it would be very much
like basketball.
 
So the MAAC may well be the wave of the future.  Currently every other
league has its "haves" and "have-nots".  But the MAAC seems to have a
collection of teams that are much more evenly balanced from top to bottom.
Right now they are not on the same level as the other four leagues -- and
they may never be.  But very, very soon they will get a bid to the tourney.
 
What will be interesting is how will the "have-nots" in other leagues react
when that happens.  Will it be more attractive to stay in a league where
chances at an NCAA bid are small, or to move to a league where you feel you
can contend for a bid every year?  I won't be surprised to see some schools
that are currently in one of the "big four" either look to the MAAC for
membership or try to band together with other schools in similar situations
to form a new league.  But a lot of scenarios still have to play themselves
out first.
 
And this all comes back to Scott Monaghan's point about where the game is
going to go, how to keep certain players from bypassing NCAA hockey for the
CHL.  It might be that if you have a Big Ten conference or an Eastern Elite
league, then those players will be more likely to stay.  Yet this isn't
going to happen overnight and it is going to involve a lot of pain and
heartache as traditional teams that happen to be among the "little guys"
are left out.  As well, it is clear that college hockey people understand
the tradition of those schools and will resist as long as possible
arrangements that will weaken their programs.  That's why I put a lot of
stock in the idea that the future will be shaped not by those people but by
the college presidents and higher ups.  If the presidents of a group of
elites get together and decide they can do better by coming together to
form a new league, then it will happen.  That's how it has gone before.
 
---                                                                   ---
Mike Machnik                [log in to unmask]               *HMM* 11/13/93
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